


Closer to Family

by whovianhiddlestoner



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alpha Timeline, Coming to Terms with Death, Cute, Family, Family Feels, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Friendship, Gen, I promise this is not sad, John is dead, Minor Character Death, Mostly Fluff, dealing with death, dirk only gets talked about but he has a major part in this, ok maybe a little, sorry - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-03
Updated: 2016-12-03
Packaged: 2018-09-06 06:35:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8738509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whovianhiddlestoner/pseuds/whovianhiddlestoner
Summary: Your heart said you should know the elderly man on TV but you've never met him. You read the headline once again; 'John Crocker Passed Away'. The unspoken words rang in your head and you asked yourself again, why do you care?-Dave hears about John Crocker's death so he tries to deal with it on his own way. He calls his best friend Rose and attempts to draw his lil' bro from the future.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Posting this in the spirit of Dave and Dirk's birthday! Wooohoo!  
> This is mostly about Alpha Universe Dave but Dirk is so not forgotten in this.

Time was ticking and not just for Dave Strider.

You felt something wet slide down your cheek and you hastily wipe it off under your shades.

Your heart said you should know the elderly man on TV but you've never met him. You read the headline once again; 'John Crocker Passed Away'. The unspoken words rang in your head and you asked yourself again, why do you care?

You skimmed the image of him shown on the screen, tinted darker thanks to your eyewear. A mix of grey and black hair stuck up in a strange way, kind blue eyes under square frames and a ridiculous bucktoothed smile. You've heard of John Crocker before, a famous comedian others claim, though his humour didn't really fit with your preference of irony. As the hot shot movie director you could've met him a hundred times but you never did.

You deeply regret that decision. Breathing got a little hard due to all the mucus filling up in your nostrils and you should probably get a tissue before you start rubbing all that green mess into your shirt's sleeve but you couldn’t bring yourself to look away from the screen.

The newscaster went on about listing the old man's accomplishments, ending it with leaving a son, Mr. Crocker, and a newly born granddaughter who he won't ever meet and you felt like you've just lost an old friend.

The image of John faded away and that's your cue to turn off the TV. Staring blankly at nothing you wiped away some other stray tears and did end up making a green mess of your shirt. Striders don't cry, you scolded yourself, especially not over old comedians that you’ve never known. It's all a little confusing and a normal person would probably keep their family close when emotionally compromised like this.

Dave Strider is no normal person, even if you did feel the urge to be close to a family member. The only dandy thing was that the only other person with your gene pool was 400 years in the future.

Figures.

A shadow of an idea nudged you out of your blank phase and you dialled one of the two numbers on your phone that really mattered to you.

The phone rang out once before you were greeted with a cool and collected voice which you found quite soothing in your confused grief.

"And how may I help a 'cool dude celebrity' if I may ask, dear Strider?" Of course she anticipated your call.

"Rose, have you seen the news?" You answered back with another question and sat by your study table. Rose Lalonde, famous author of the decade and friend of yours for years now. You might even add that she was your best friend.

"Oh..." The voice wavered a little and you already knew her answer. "I presume it is about the news of the comedian, Mr. Crocker."

"Yeah." You said flatly to cover yourself up in your familiar mask of nonchalance.

"Let me tell you Rose, I have this real fuckin' strange feelin' about that old dude, like I'm not saying that the news of a complete stranger kicking the bucket makes me weep up salty rivers of manly tears, so very, very salty tears Rose, even the Dead Sea would be jealous of that amount of salt in these totally metaphorical eye-waters that's existence yall can psychoanalyse another time-"

"Dave, as amusing as I find it I must ask you to stop rambling." Rose kindly yet pressingly cut you off and you could practically picture her black lipstick decorated lips pulling up into a smug smirk.

"Sorry. Point is I feel like I know the dude somehow." You finally said as you rested your elbow on your desk and let your head fall into your palm, fingers lightly digging into your blonde hair. "But that's impossible. I never met him and I think I would remember seeing a stupid buckteeth like that."

You heard a sigh at the other end. "I know just how you feel. When I saw the news it was just like... losing an old friend.”

"Losing an old friend." The two of you finished together. You imagined her lavender eyes looking at you with sympathy, the same way you were staring at the wooden imprints on the desk.

"Well it is quite possible that we knew Mr. Crocker in another life or universe. Lingering memories and feelings may not be unusual in our case, don't you think?" She said. However bullshit it all sounded, coming from Rose Lalonde made you believe anything she might spew out with such seriousness.

Your red eyes gazed across your desk's contents and your idea that indicated this call crept back to you.  You sat up straight in your comfy wheelie chair and pulled up a clean piece of paper.

"Probably. Buuuuuuut this is not why I actually called you." You heard another 'Oh' come from her but this one was not as surprised as before.

"Rose... can you see what Dirk is up to?" You asked hopefully.

What, you forgot to mention that your good friend could kinda-sorta see the future? The feeling of needing family near you didn’t leave you and this was the closest you could feel to your little brother; through Rose. You'd have to be a fucking idiot not to take the opportunity of pestering her constantly just to have a glimpse of the kid's life.

You may knew Dirk barely better than John Crocker, but hell if you didn't care so fucking much for him. The towering apartment you lived in was already half full of supplies for the lil' dude's arrival.

Rose hummed into the phone. "It seems like he is pestering my Roxy." She said with fondness, probably more directed to her daughter than Dirk. You clung to every word she said.

"He's just finished describing his adventure exploring the underwater ruins. Roxy is explaining her newest code and Dirk is helping to polish out the smaller mistypings in it. Such clever kids." You could hear the proud smile through the phone.

"Yeah." You breathed, also can't helping but feeling pride. Your eyes found the blank paper before you and you quickly grabbed a pencil.

"Could you, like, describe him in detail? I mean his face and shit."

"Well as far as similarities go he has your nose and same colour of hair." She began and you started putting up lines on the paper.

Not many know about you that you could actually draw decently. Not great, but it was better than most. The secret was that for drawing SBaHJ you used your left hand, the shitty one to get that shitty effect. It made it the perfect amount of ironic. Although ever since you started working with movies you haven't had the time to draw those characters again.

Your non ironic drawing style was maybe a little bit unique. Only using a few very definitive lines that rarely joined together, yet still conveyed the characteristics of the person.

Rose continued. "He also has that same unreadable expression of yours. And he shares your interest in eyewear; he has very triangular and pointy sunglasses."

"Shades, Rose. Those are shades and they probably look very cool on the kid." You cut her off, all the while your hand kept up with its work.

"My apologies. He's wearing very pointy 'shades'." The woman mocked you.

"As I said Dirk has your same shade of hair but he has it all spiked up, pointing more backwards and put out of his face except for his fringe. Those Japanese cartoons he watches might not be the best influence on him." Rose said with a hint of laughter.

You stopped drawing just to stare daggers at an imaginary Rose. "Did you just question my lil' bro's fashion choices?"

"I would never!" She said in exaggerated offence. "I merely offered my opinion and insight on the matter."

You continued to work on your drawing in this fashion, occasionally asking for some finer details and the author gladly obliged.

"Thank you, Rose." You stared out the window into the orange sky as you finished your work.

"Any time. Though I wouldn't mind you telling beforehand when you will be tiring me out like this."

After the pleasantries of saying goodbye you hung up and let yourself admire your work.

So that was your brother... more or less. You may need to send a copy to Rose to check how accurate your artistic skills were. However, as you gazed upon the image of Dirk you thought he looked every ounce a Strider, and you may have felt just a little bit closer to family.

~*~

Time was ticking.

You were barely out of breath as you heavily frowned at the ever increasing pools of blood right at the nose of your shoes.

The fight was just as underwhelming as a battle against two juggalos sounded.

You turned your back to the corpses. With this done there was only one foe left on this Earth. If you could trust Rose's visions, and why wouldn't you, all you could do was give your best in that fight and to die a hero together.

You sure do hoped your death would inspire Dirk.

The air was awfully still and quite after the aftermath of battle as you fished out your wallet from a pocket and flipped it open. The sketched image of a boy with anime hair and triangle shades looked back at you. The very same picture you've drawn all those years ago, only a smaller print.

For maybe the last of your time you wanted to feel close to family, close to your lil' bro.

There was a thought that gave you small comfort. Back in your apartment, Dirk's future apartment, right above your desk was a bulletin board hanging on the wall, filled with your favourite pictures. One photo of Rose and another of your other dear friend, Jade English, perfectly captured by you. Sometime you heard that Jade's brother was John Crocker... now both of them were dead. Beside them was the original picture that you were holding in your wallet. And right next to it a drawing of you dedicated for Dirk, and those pictures will wait for him right up there.

You pocketed your wallet and stared at the sky, the sunlight reflecting from your shades.

Time was ticking and you had a job to do.

But first you were going to fly up into the sun on a shitty JPEG skateboard and a sword in your hand.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Kudos are cool and comments a super mega awesome, so please do provide them generously.  
> <3


End file.
